- cross-posted to:
- piracy@lemmy.dbzer0.com
- technology@lemmy.world
- cross-posted to:
- piracy@lemmy.dbzer0.com
- technology@lemmy.world
We are also changing how remote playback works for streaming personal media (that is, playback when not on the same local network as the server). The reality is that we need more resources to continue putting forth the best personal media experience, and as a result, we will no longer offer remote playback as a free feature. This—alongside the new Plex Pass pricing—will help provide those resources. This change will apply to the future release of our new Plex experience for mobile and other platforms.
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All these comments mentioning jellyfish and I haven’t see a single mention of emby. Is it considered bad or something? Because I switched over to it and I am liking it a lot better than plex so far
As a plex pass lifetime user, this doesn’t change anything for me.
I am, however, blown away that the price went from $75 CDN to $350 CDN over the last 10 years!! That’s just insane!
Jellyfin needs to partner with someone people can pay a very low and reasonable and/or one-time fee to enable remote streaming without the fuss of setting up either dangerous port-forwarding or the complexity of reverse proxies (paying for a domain-name, the set-up itself including certificates, keeping it updated for security purposes).
And no a VPN is not a solution, the difficulty for non-technical users in setting up a VPN (if it’s even possible, on smart-tvs it’s almost always not, and I don’t think devices like AppleTV and other streaming boxes often support them) is too high and it’s an unwanted annoyance even for technical users.
I’m not talking about streaming video’s through someone else’s servers or using their bandwidth. I’m talking about the connection phase of clients and servers where Plex acts like an enhanced dynamic DNS service with authentication. They have an agent on the local media server which sends to the remote web service of the third party the IP address, the port configured for use, the account or server name, etc. When a client tries to connect they go to this remote web service with the servername/username info, the web service authenticates them then gives them the current IP address and any other information necessary. It then sends some data to the local Jellyfin server about the connecting client to enable that connection and then the local media Jellyfin server and the client talk directly and stream directly.
Importantly the cost of running this authentication and IP address tracking scheme would be minimal per Jellyfin server. You could charge $5/year for up to 20 unique remote clients and come out ahead with a slight profit which could be put back into Jellyfin development and things like their own hosting costs for code, etc. Even better if they offer lifetime for this at $60-$80 they’d get a decent chunk of cash up-front to use for development (with reasonable use restrictions per account so someone hosting stuff in Hetzner or whatever and serving 300 people with 400 devices will need to pay more because they’re clearly doing this for profit and can afford to throw some more money at Jellyfin).
Until Jellyfin offers something that JUST WORKS like that it’s not going to be a replacement for Plex, whatever other improvements they offer to users it’s still a burden for the server runner to set up remote streaming in a way that isn’t either incredibly dangerous (port forwarding) OR either involves paying money to third parties AND/OR the trouble of running your own reverse proxy and/or involves walking users through complicated set-up process for each device that you have to repeat if you change anything major like your domain name when using a VPN.
I dumped Plex years ago even though I paid for it. Too many issues with it. Constantly losing movie folders, unable to stream to the device I wanted to watch on, wrong codec, wrong sound, etc, etc. I gave up. I’m sure it worked fine for most, but it got to be a pain. Switched to Jellyfin and a DDNS address and have had zero problems since. And it’s free.
So I have a lifetime Plex pass, but my friend (who is remote) does not. Does this change mean they have the have a Plex pass to connect to my device remotely?
Edit: thanks for the info! After I posted I continued reading and realized that question was already answered! Appreciate the help!
If you want to keep using plex and remote it’s important to you, they usually have pretty good deals on pass from time to time. I don’t regret my lifetime pass - I still feel like it’s a pretty solid app and service all things considered- but if I didn’t have the pass already I would be a bit pissed as well ngl.
If you don’t like the price there’s always jellyfin.
Got to say that I have been very happy with it.
Jellyfin is just so much better, imo. Much cleaner, less stuff that I don’t actually need.
I’m a plex pass lifetime owner, but I don’t regret switching to Jellyfin one bit.
Does Jellyfin do remote streaming?
Yes. You’ll have to set up a reverse proxy, I use nginx, and get yourself domain, I use duck DNS, and get a SSL certificate from let’s encrypt if your wanting to steam to something like a Chromecast or Roku.
It’s not all that hard honestly and there’s a good guide here for general home media, including both Plex and jellyfin
Here’s the thing though, for the average plex user (myself included) you’ve already used too many acronyms and words I don’t understand. Plex serves a purpose for a lot of people, people who are even willing to pay for it to be easy.
Kind of reminds me of Netflix before anyone else did streaming. They had so much stuff I stopped sailing.
Well that sucks.
Assuming you know them well enough, can’t you just give your IP address to folks and forward the port on your router?
You can, but the reason you use a reverse proxy, isn’t revealing your IP or something, it’s that without it, the traffic is unencrypted.
As in, log in details and the contents of media streams are sent fully readable by any network node on the way.
Or just use tailscale. Much easier.
With the caviat that you have tailscale enabled on both devices. This prevents it from being used on a roku outside your home but you could access it remotely from your computer/phone/tablet.
It is significantly harder than Plex, currently. There are improvements happening all the time though.
You very much can create an external port and access anywhere without any of this. No tailscale needed but I’d recommend one knows what they are doing…
Hmmm, i use a Synology NAS with Jellyfin installed and my family can use their Roku TVs without issue. I didn’t realize Synology made a difference there
It totally depends on how you expose it to the outside world. If it’s exposed just like it is, it works fine with every device. If you put an authentication before it (e.g. Authelia), it can only be accessed by browsers from outside the network. That being said, it’s not recommended to expose Jellyfin directly, because there are a ton of security flaws. Best practice is to use a VPN
Well I’m a Luddite so I’m probably exposing myself to miners or something
I do this too but it only works on my home network not remotely.
Huh? I’m streaming from my Jellyfin just fine when I’m on the go, with no tailscale or other VPN set up
It was significantly harder to set up remote access for Jellyfin than Plex 6 months ago. I ha ent attempted since. With Plex there was literally no set up, it just works. Until it just works without having to do any extra work, Jellyfin will struggle with adoption.
I have both running, and thatd a big difference to me. Also I prefer the way Plex detects intros and credits for skipping and their detection for captions. Once that’s all sorted Jellyfin wins in every field.
Yeah I switched 2-3 years ago because so many features were paywalled and on jellyfin I can at least use plugins
I switched when I had an internet outage and couldn’t log into Plex locally to watch my own media. Very happy with Jellyfin since then.
does jellyfin have a roku app?
does jellyfin have a roku app?
Yes, it streams pretty well, it has some UX issues, but it will let you get off plex as it stands right now with most of your needs covered.
It works, but isn’t nearly as user friendly.
Yes. I use mine daily and it works great
If the server you are stealing movies from has a pass you still don’t need to pay
They could have worded this better
Well that’s the beginning of the end for them.
I’m about half-way off the platform already (and I’m a lifetime subscriber)
The only thing I go back for is Roku use (better app), PlexAmp (better app) and offline viewing. I don’t have to go off JF for those, but it’s a lot better on Plex.
But it’s not so much better than I can’t protest.
Well that fuckin sucks dick.
How exciting, I’m getting a kick up the arse to change platforms! Seems to be the theme of 2025!
Glad I went Emby.
Time to move to Jellyfin for the rest of their users?
I’m not pirating a bunch of shows just to pay Plex for the privilege of watching it.
Jellyfin ftw
Also remember to give them your credit card, name and address for the privilege of pirating the content.
Even better, it’s now a nice database of who companies and governments can go after when they want or need to!
lmao me either
Huh, I was somewhat excited about the elimination of the playback limit for mobile apps (we are in 2025 ffs!) and then re-read that this will be only applicable for the subpar preview version once it is released… Which doesn’t fucking has the watch together feature lmao.
The only good news in a nutshell is that I am still a Plex Pass Lifetime User, so in a nutshell I don’t get good news lol.
